Keep On! : the Story of Matthew Henson, Co-Discoverer of the North Pole / Written by Deborah Hopkinson ; Written by :1
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“The black darkness of the sky, the stars twinkling above, and hour after hour going by with no sunlight. Every now and then Rhodamine/Magenta (V) a moon when storms do not W/F come, and always the cold, 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 getting colder and colder…” —Matthew Henson TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black For Deborah Wiles, a true friend on this journey and always there to haul me out of holes. —D. H. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS For Leo, loyal sleigh-riding companion of my youth. Special thanks to Genevieve LeMoine, —S. A Curator of the Peary-Macmillan Arctic Museum at Bowdoin College, for her generous assistance. Published by PEACHTREE PUBLISHERS 1700 Chattahoochee Avenue Atlanta, Georgia 30318-2112 www.peachtree-online.com Keep On! Text © 2009 by Deborah Hopkinson Illustrations © 2009 by Stephen Alcorn All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher. THE STORY OF Book and cover design by Stephen Alcorn and Loraine M. Joyner TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W Composition by Melanie McMahon Ives Illustrations created as giclee prints of original drawings on archival vellum and hand-tinted in watercolor; titles typeset Matthew Henson in Caxton bold, text typeset in Caxton book and book italic, and time line typeset in Optima and Sabon bold. Printed in Singapore CO-DISCOVERER OF THE 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Rhodamine/Magenta (V) Library of Congress W/F Cataloging-in-Publication Data North Pole Hopkinson, Deborah. Keep on! : the story of Matthew Henson, co-discoverer of the North Pole / written by Deborah Hopkinson ; written by :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP illustrated by Stephen Alcorn. p. cm. deborah hopkinson ISBN 13: 978-1-56145-473-0 ISBN 10: 1-56145-473-7 1. Henson, Matthew Alexander, 1866-1955--Juvenile literature. 2. African American explorers--Biography--Juvenile literature. illustrated by 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 3. Explorers--United States--Biography--Juvenile literature. 4. North Pole--Discovery and exploration--Juvenile literature. stephen alcorn 5. Arctic regions--Discovery and exploration--Juvenile literature. I. Alcorn, Stephen, ill. II. Title. G635.H4H67 2009 W/F 910.911'3--dc22 2008031118 Rhodamine/Magenta (V) The text of KEEP ON! is based on primary and secondary sources. Every attempt has been made to verify the information contained within, and any errors are the responsibility of the author. IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W The artwork is inspired by the text and is a creative interpretation of the events described. TJ444-9-2008 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black MATTHEW HENSON was born in a Maryland cabin, at a time when boys dreamed of finding glory, of planting flags at the ends of the Earth, making the unknown known, and recording their names into history books. Young Matt had that same hunger to explore, but most folks would have laughed at his dreams. TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W For Matt was born in 1866, just after the Civil War, a time when poor black boys like him had few chances to roam the next county, Rhodamine/Magenta (V) to say nothing of another country, the seven seas, W/F or the top of the world. :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 W/F Rhodamine/Magenta (V) IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 5 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black By the time he was thirteen, Matt was alone. He set out to make his way in the world, trudging the long road from Washington, D.C., to the harbor of Baltimore. What a bustling place it was! Gulls screeched; men shouted and rushed about, loading and unloading ships of every size. TJ444-9-2008 And Matt stood alone, keen as an Arctic fox, IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W eager to pounce on any chance he could find. Rhodamine/Magenta (V) W/F :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 W/F Rhodamine/Magenta (V) IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 7 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Matt spied the Katie Hines, a three-masted vessel so sharp and bright, she seemed like a star gliding on water. And when he spotted her proud, white-haired captain, Matt begged for a chance to go to sea. It was breaking the rules to let a boy under fifteen sail, TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W but that old sea dog took a liking to him, and Matthew Alexander Henson became his cabin boy. Rhodamine/Magenta (V) W/F :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 “I shipped as cabin-boy, on board a vessel bound for China. After my first W/F voyage…I became an able-bodied seaman…sailing to China, Japan…North Africa, Rhodamine/Magenta (V) Spain, France, and through the Black Sea to Southern Russia.” IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 9 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black For the next five years, Matt’s school was the world, his classroom the boat. Captain Childs taught him history and mathematics, and soon Matt could navigate by the stars, tie sailor’s knots, and fix or build most anything. TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W Rhodamine/Magenta (V) W/F :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 W/F Rhodamine/Magenta (V) IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 11 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black After Captain Childs died, Matt left the sea, unsure of his course. He was working in a store in Washington, D.C., when a naval engineer named Robert E. Peary came looking for a hat—and found an assistant besides. Matt proved so able that Peary asked him to join his next expedition to Greenland. Soon Matt realized Peary’s heart was set TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W on one goal: to be the first to stand at the top of the world. Rhodamine/Magenta (V) W/F :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 W/F Rhodamine/Magenta (V) IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 13 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black But the Pole was not an easy prize, and Peary and Matt had much to learn about the harsh, cold north. Matt studied with new teachers now: the Inuit. Of all the explorers who entered their world, Matt was their favorite, and they gave him the nickname Mahri-Pahlik, Matthew the Kind One. TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W Rhodamine/Magenta (V) W/F :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 W/F Rhodamine/Magenta (V) “I have come to love these people. I know every man, woman, and child in their tribe. They are my friends and they regard me as theirs.” IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 15 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Matt took the time to listen, to learn their language, and to make friends. He studied how to build and drive a dog sledge, and how to dress and hunt in order to survive. Hard-working, skilled, and kind, Matt Henson earned the respect of all. TJ444-9-2008 IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W Rhodamine/Magenta (V) W/F :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP :1 “Eight days out and not a shot, not a sight of game, nothing. The night is coming W/F Rhodamine/Magenta (V) quickly, the long months of darkness, of quiet and cold, that, in spite of my years of experience, I can never get used to…” IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 17 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Through years of struggle and heartbreak, the explorers faced furious storms, the shifting ice, and always, always, the unrelenting, desperate cold. On Peary’s 1906 expedition, he and Matt set a record, TJ444-9-2008 reaching farther north than anyone had before. IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W But storms forced them back, the top of the world still out of reach, Rhodamine/Magenta (V) nearly two hundred miles away. W/F :1 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP 1.25”XH:9.75” 150L 140 IKPP “The wind would find the tiniest opening in our clothing and pierce us with the :1 force of driving needles. Our hoods froze to our growing beards and when we W/F halted we had to break away the ice that had been formed…” Rhodamine/Magenta (V) IMUS 7/PCA0174 Keep On W TJ444-9-2008 19 Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Cyan Magenta Yellow Black Peary was determined to make one final try. And so on July 6, 1908, Peary’s team of explorers set sail again on the Roosevelt, a ship so strong it could push through the Arctic ice.